vertigo and other Alfred Hitchcock related ailments

It could have been worse. When I realised these were proper dizzy spells that would just not go away I thought The doctor would diagnose Labrynthitis. Honestly, my husband does a very good David Bowie impression, my life would have been unbearable!

But no, it was just vertigo. No point in telling them I'm not afraid of Heights. The Physicians Assistant printed off some diagrams of the ear to help explain slowly and carefully to me in her whispered Eastern European accents ( lovely they are too) that er... something is unbalanced behind my ears. Yes , yes it could be connected to my infected tooth... or a virus or ... we don't know.

There was only one cure and it was exercise! She searched Google for them and found a diagram of a man closing his eyes. turning his head 45 degrees and lying down on his side, then up again and down on the other side. BRILLIANT! lying down! that's my kind of exercise. Got to do them 3 times a day? No problemo, I may even bring out an exercise DVD ( chortle, chortle...ohh dizzy spell etc.)

These exercises will make you feel worse, make you feel sick.
One thing, can I drive?
No you will be a dangerous driver.
Oh...
Another thing, I'm a drama teacher. That's ok right?
No you cannot be responsible for children.
I decide to refrain mentioning my own children and ask  can I have a doctor's note
No , The law of this country says you self certificate for a week, if you are still bad, come back. Also have three points of support. one, two ( bashes legs) three ( flourishes arm) If you are still dizzy and sick come back.

I don't go to look round ANY schools for their Open Evenings or Open days. Daddy becomes Taxi driver no1, Suddenly I can see that he thinks our Kids do TOO MUCH.

At the weekend my tooth flares up again, despite my having finished my antibiotics and not touched alcohol all week, because I thought they would be more effective. Monda,y I return to dentist for major antibiotics, she doesn't think the tooth has anything to do with my vertigo.

I ring the doctors' surgery to speak to the Physician's Assistant.
She's no longer with us.
What? When did that happen?

I am told to ring tomorrow morning and the doctor will call me back. I leave it til Weds, incase I get better. I don't. I call and have to insist someone call me back. The doctor rings me back about an hour and a half later and asks about it. I tell her I am doing the exercises.
We can prescribe you a course of tablets, 5 days. Don't drive. I'll give you a note for work for another week. Come back if you aren't better.

Better make the appointment now, I think , just in case. Why didn't I get tablets last week?

This week I did borrow a stick from my father in law. I had to explain to everyone that I hadn't hurt my foot AS WELL, but its just to stop me falling over.Now no longer have to use eldest child as a crutch. I think I may have started a new trend , all the mummies-at- the -gate will be using them next week.

Oh , one of my neighbours pointed out that a white van  keeps driving up and down our cul de sac. I dismissed him as the rag and bone man, but woke up today feeling paranoid about break ins. I will be perched up against The REAR WINDOW with binoculars for the rest of the day. ( one of the dangers of being off work sick and a bit bored )

bully boys

So on Saturday morning,  I am talking casually to middle child about what she will actually allow me to put into her school sandwich box, hoping she will slip up and express a preference for something other than dry bread.
One day this term I gave her boiled egg and she was teased by other boys but she put them straight with an indignant toss of her head ... or so I thought. But mentioning egg sandwich opened a whole other tub of worms.
Last January, I discovered my little girl was being picked on in the playground by a group of lads who had decided she had "the bogey touch" so no one else was allowed to touch her or go near her. I informed her teacher who dealt with it well, a couple of the boys cried. I had asked my little girl if everything was ok and she said yes it was. Life went on.
Only when all but one of the boys started to do it again nearly straight away she decided she was going to ignore it. They didn't stop. She didn't tell me, she didn't tell the teacher. The other children in her year who witnessed it didn't say anything either. Last week her elder sister complained because she kept trying to play with her on the Upper School side of the playground. Even then middle child didn't say why.
I strode in on Monday morning, the new head teacher was busy, I left a pre-penned letter and said I would be home all day. I waited. At lunchtime, I rang the school after Daddy badgered me. The receptionist was flustered, she had given the Head the letter but wasn't sure what had happened next. The Head would ring she said. At 3p.m. I rang again, got another receptionist who didn't know what I was on about, the Head was out at a meeting, but she left me on hold and came back saying the Head of Year wanted to speak to me at the gate. We did actually go into her classroom when I got there.
The upshot was that the the majority of the boys confessed. The two that denied were outed by witnesses. They had their play time taken off them for a day and were made to apologise. Their names have gone into the behaviour book. They have written letters of apology during lunch time, when my eldest happened to be passing through the room to hear one of the try to deny it again.
"Yes you did do it" she says ( I imagine with great contempt, hand on hip, surveying them with disdain) " You all bullied her" she said.
Apparently the TA over looking the process took my eldest to one side to try to persuade her it wasn't really bullying. My eldest didn't speak but she disagreed and thought the TA couldn't have known that it was going on from reception until now.
The school has not informed the parents again, as this is" another academic year "from the last incident.
I wasn't happy. I know three of the mum's, Have one of their mobile numbers in  my phone. Standing at the school gates and not saying anything is hard. If I was their parents I would want to know and not stand there unaware that another Mother is standing near by silently writhing with rage and ( yes I will say it) JUDGING.
 I know what they have done is petty, but not to my little girl. On the surface she may not appear bothered, but inside she feels sick and her anger boils over quickly at home. I know that they are only little boys, but its a good job none of them were in my kitchen last Saturday morning when she told me.

missing out on stuff

On Friday, I found myself in the staff room with women around my age range and with kids. They were talking about someone senior who was trying to leave early to attend some function their kid's school was putting on. It meant someone having to cover a class and two cover supervisors were absent.
I walked in at the tail end of the conversation about that certain member of the staff - I'm still not sure who they were talking about to be honest, but I don't think they elicited much sympathy from the group. However the conversation developed into a "the things I have missed my kids do because I work ..."

I have had this conversation with others quite a few times recently, perhaps because the latter part of the summer term sees sports days and leaving assemblies and concerts. The junior school my two eldest go to put on an art exhibition on Monday a.m. ,  talent show final on Tuesday ( my kids didn't get through this year, don't get me started on that!), a sports day on Weds and a summer fayre on ...Saturday! I would rather my children go to a school where they do a lot of creative stuff, rather than do none, but it does add to mummy guilt and with everything else going on, I couldn't ask Nanny and Grandad to cover me this week.

I made it to sports day. I did a lot of cheering and I rescued my daughter from a big, hairy moth that decided to crawl up her t shirt. oh and I nearly got hit by the relay race baton.

I was allowed to watch another sports days two weeks ago, because year 11 left and freed up Thursday afternoons. I did not make youngest sport's day and I am still upset at missing her Mothers Day assembly because HMI decided to watch me teach year 10 instead. I was available to take eldest to her violin exam a few months ago and also took a couple of her friends because their parents were working. The headteacher arrived and urged me to leave the rest to her care. I was reluctant, one of the girls I'd taken is my daughter's best friend. Her mother knew I was with her, when I said I might go, she burst into tears. I cuddled her and she was fine. She got a distinction. Her mum had mummy guilt.

There is a concert a week on Wednesday for the eldest, her father will miss it because its his own school production. I may have to take her younger sisters, which means i will miss quite a bit of it! My friend is taking her to piano grade 1.( I hope she doesn't cry) Nanny is going to last day concert, as I will be going to reception last day concert.

I made it  to middle child's starring role as soldier 2 in their Moses play and I saw her valentine's class assembly. I went to play games with youngest's class, I will be able to go in and see her books in open day, I will miss the junior school open day its on a day I work.

Last Sunday my eldest was sulking because no one was going to see her art work, " no one ever comes..." she began. I stopped her and reminded her that it wasn't true, but I do hope when they get older, they remember me coming to stuff and trying my hardest to get them to the events and past times they have chosen to do. I'm not sure what I'm trying to say here. I would like to be able to get to everything, to be the one at the front, sitting bolt upright with charged up video camera, recording it in surround sound and 3D, with a big smile and a Pushy Mother Badge. Instead I sit for a few minutes in a staff room, competing with others over the stuff I am missing out on.

element of suprise

Tomorrow my husband is fifty. He doesn’t look it: damn him, neither does he act it but I think he might be starting to feel it.

Anyway, for his fortieth he had a baby and also a telescope. There is no trumping that really.

I didn’t organise a surprise party because he would hate that and he would spoil it by finding out or refusing to go to it.

A few months ago I started to ask him how he wanted to celebrate. He didn’t know. He ummed and ahhed and then two weeks ago decided on a family meal (extended family and best friend) in the local Italian restaurant where we always celebrate his birthday.

I’ve known what I was going to buy him since last summer when he fell in love with a limited print in a gallery in Bed Gellert, north Wales. However the gallery opens seasonally and I started to panic. Once I did get hold of them they no longer had the print and so I had to order it direct from the irish based artist. I started to get cold feet. Perhaps time would have cooled his love of the art work. I showed it to my hairdresser who didn’t like it much. This made the doubts stronger. I also had to try to order it on my phone so that he wouldn’t see it on the browser history. My phone always seemed to lose connection with the internet before I got to paying for the print. All of this boded ill.

On a trip to IKEA, he reminisced about a chair he had owned and discarded. “ That’s what you could buy me for my birthday, a chair.” He announced.

This seemed so right.

“I’ve already decided what I’m going to buy you” I stammered.

“Oh go with that then” he said.

Now it preyed on me, he WANTED a chair, he never asks for presents usually. He might hate the print.

I couldn’t rest.

A few days later, before falling asleep,“ I’ll get you the chair, “I said, ”but you will have to choose it so its perfect.”

“I might like what you are going to buy me” he protested.

“I’m not sure it’s the right present”

“What is it?”

“It’s a surprise, unless you want the chair.”

After about half an hour, he was sure he wanted the chair and wanted to know what my present was. Reluctantly I told him.

He groaned, “ That would have been perfect!” and hid under the bed clothes, like a big kid upset he’d spoilt a surprise.

I asked his mum to give me a picture of him as a child in his astronaut suit. Somehow it fell out of my handbag and although it was still in the picture wallet I’m sure he looked at it. Still I went to get his cake with two of our three girls today. The youngest came in and said to the middle child

“Don’t tell daddy about the cake.”

“WHAT CAKE?!!!”

Daddy pretended to be deaf.

I have just bought him a helium balloon, it’s in the car boot. I know he is going to go out and open the boot before midnight, I just know it. He doesn’t do surprises.

birthday celebrations

Now I only have myself to blame. I have three children , you think I’d have more sense, but we do tend to throw each child a party for  their birthday. The middle child gets short changed having a birthday in August,  we are often at the seaside. To make up for it last year, she invited a group of girls for an afternoon tea in September.

My youngest had her fifth birthday at a wacky warehouse but previous birthdays  saw me shaking off the January blues and  breaking out in a sweat, cleaning the entire house two weeks after Christmas and decking out the downstairs in a theme of her choosing (pirates and princesses aged 3 and Under the sea aged 4)  We ransacked the costume and set cupboards at school and I begged an art teacher to draw me a pirate for pin- the- parrot- on-the-pirate and a pirate ship, which the children decided to colour in before I got around to pinning the jolly roger on it.

My eldest daughter was told last year , that she was too old for parties. Then I secretly invited five of her friends and a cousin to the bowling alley and pizza place the Saturday before her birthday. A couple of hours before, I bathed all three kids, painted their nails with glitter and put their party dresses and shoes on with a “it’s just nice to dress up sometimes isn’t it?” I actually couldn’t believe they fell for it, it was only daddy who nearly blew it, he was so excited we nearly got there too early and had to side track to Aldi to get a bottle of wine. I am at this point texting everyone to make sure they are there. They were.

We walked through the doors and her friends shouted “surprise!” My beautiful daughter, turned around in panic to see who she was supposed to be shouting “ surprise” at! One of her friends had to explain to her that it was her own party. She loved it, once she got over the shock and I have been smug about it right up until about a week a go when she requested doing the same thing but knowing about it this time. I suddenly thought that she had missed looking forward to her treat. That realisation finally took the shine off my success.

My husband is 50 next week, we are going for a family meal. I didn’t attempt a surprise party. I couldn’t even keep his present a surprise, blurting it out when I thought we had decided on something else, only to find that it would have been a perfectly lovely surprise after all. I do want him to have a really good day, as my memory of his 40^th is that it was over taken by a week old baby, mastitis and baby blues. The hi-light was him taking our screaming infant for a walk while his hormonally deranged wife wept herself to sleep. His birthday tea was interrupted by a trip to the walk in clinic. That’s not the plan this time.

strike days

So it's a teacher strike day and you have two options: 1. you can view spending the day with your children as an unexpected bonus or 2.  an inconvenience and vent your feelings about the teaching profession on social networks.

 I am a teacher three days a week (officially), but not today. Being part time, the strike has fallen on a day off. My union isn't striking so I would have been in work anyway. I am, however, avoiding social network sites today after writing a Jerry Maguire style status which I am scared will go viral as a couple of friends have already shared it!

Back to the way I am spending my day. Only two of my three children are affected so we waved goodbye to the eldest at 8.40, leaving her on a deserted playground and our day began. There are things I have to do today, so we returned home and tidied up a bit, made the builders tea, my children helped me collect donations from our local church and take them to the Food Bank . All this with the promise of a visit to Fun World, where the toddler mummies have been surprised as a legion of mums, dads and other carers descend upon them with big kids.

I am sitting in this cold shed trying to blog for the first time on my mobile phone with one eye on the kids. They don't need me and they won't want me until they are thirsty (except when I had to help 5 year old  down curl- wurly slide, I would have happily gone up again but she wasn’t having any of it) Later we are going to the supermarket to buy interesting things for tea - they have a friend coming. They will have to sit and watch a film for some part of the day as I have a full day of work tomorrow and I tend to plan Weds afternoon, otherwise they spend Sunday afternoons in front of telly whilst their mummy and daddy prepare, mark, plan, discuss and despair. (Oops gone back  to whinging teacher mode and I am not one of those today.) Its not the way I wanted to spend the day, I had thought about the zoo, but then the strike day would cost me £40 plus what-ever I spend for lunch. I might start complaining about my comrades then.

Anyway, today is busier than I had hoped, a school friend of my husband is coming over tonight, so I cannot say “stuff it” and play with the girls all day like I really, really want to do. We have to go home and do the chores, or at least think very hard about doing them. Besides the builders will need me soon, like my girls, they get thirsty, someone has to make the tea ;-)

 

Post script: Then I get a message from the school I work in: Ofsted are in tomorrow.  Karma? You can keep it!

 

matching socks

There are days in our household when nothing goes right, quite a lot of them, in fact. Days when I am reduced to drying tights with a hairdryer or digging out nearly fresh socks from the dirty linen bin. Those days when, after I have walked the girls to school and am kissing them goodbye, I notice that they are in a dirty dress, they still have tooth paste over their mouth, breakfast round their face, shoes on the wrong feet or odd socks on.

Odd socks are actually the norm in our house. I think you can get away with it in the winter when you’re wearing boots, I tend to be able to find matching school socks, but the weekend is a nightmare. We usually try to make a feature of it, like it’s done on purpose because we are a wacky and carefree family who delight in the freedom of mismatching footwear. The jubilant days when we all (including the man of the house) have matching socks are rare indeed but give me such a sense of achievement, when that happens we would wear sandals in the snow to show just how organised I am!

 

austerity cuts

There are a number of things my children have done since they were tiny and I suppose like everything when its free (or at least very reasonable) you take it for granted, until it is no longer there. Then you value it, then you miss it like hell and resent whoever it is that has taken it away.

One of the things we do is go to a local library. We spend an hour there, I am complimented on my animated reading aloud skills (my drama training wasn’t wasted.) The librarians are helpful and cheerful, they know stuff about books too which is a plus. When the children were little, my child minder used to take them to storytelling on Thursday afternoons.

This all started to change 18 months ago, the librarians’ smiles started to disappear and then so did the librarians. They are being replaced by a card system, I’m not sure how that will help some of the senior citizens fathom the internet. The next to go, is the lady who produces the monthly quiz. March is the last one. I think she had decided to stop when she knew her time was up, after all she had done in it her own time, under her own volition. An elderly gentleman expressed disappointment and she gave in. The last quiz now lies on the desk.

Since taking the children, I have started to read library books again. I have read history books, biographies, romances, mythology and I discovered Phillippa Gregory just before the BBC did.

Last month we were asked to fill out a questionnaire about opening hours. One solution was to close it on a Saturday. A Saturday! Are you kidding? Do you not want children to read? There is a popular dance school taking place in the church directly in front of the library, on Saturdays the library is full of tots in tutus.

On a recent trip to the library on a rainy Saturday afternoon, I parked the car in one of the few spaces by the library (look, we had a lot of heavy books ok, we do usually walk) and talked to the children about the changes happening to the library and a few other services we use. I tried to explain to them that the council had to save 123 million pounds. They didn’t understand.

Every third Sunday of the month, there is a nature club. My niece and my middle child are the same age, they love to go bird watching and bug hunting and canal boating. Last Sunday was the last session, although there are activities in the Easter holidays. My girls came home in a militant mood. They wanted to protest, they wanted to raise money, even if it meant me baking lots and lots of cakes for a bake sale.

I once again tried to explain the reasons behind the cuts, but my middle child wailed in most righteous indignation, “But why are they cutting all the joy?”

Anyone?

builders

My builders aren’t happy. The sun has gone in. “How are we expected to work in these conditions!” they demand in mock indignation. The weather in the midlands has been good for the last month and so my extension has had a rapid start. The builders are great, two family men with growing children and an anecdote for every occasion. They have built the street I live in, well not quite but almost. Nearly every extension has been done by them, all my neighbours know them and take it in turns to keep them serviced with tea and in some cases biscuits when I am not there or if they think I have been tardy with my tea making duties. Last week I sallied forth in order to replenish their mugs once I had finished my planning to find them slurping out of the man from no 16’s chunky, earthenware mugs. They looked a bit uncomfortable, I picked up my empty mis-matching mugs and flashed them a smile. Man from no 16 smiled back, I made a comment about the weather , we all relaxed. I came in and made myself a cup of tea.

The builders have worked for us before, they knocked through our two living rooms to make a large living space downstairs. They knocked our wall down. A few months later we walked passed them as they were rebuilding no 30’s garage and my eldest daughter, exclaimed “what are they doing now?”

“They are building Lizbeth a new bedroom,” I explained

“What? They BUILD things too!”

I ran off to tell them that my precious child thought they just knocked stuff down. The main builder nodded seriously at her.

“ Yes we build things to, “ he said , “ and sometimes they stay up too.”

She is now looking forward to the two new bedrooms that they are building. I am looking forward to a bathroom with a full sized bath, not that I will get any “me- time “ to soak in it! I am not looking forward to next week when they finally break though and the building work becomes a reality inside the house. I remember when we had the downstairs extended 8 years ago. I am not house proud, but the dust drove me to the brink. Everything was dusty; me, husband, toddler and cat. Once more onto the breach…

As I returned form the school run this morning, the builders were sipping from their flasks, cogitating today’s work.

“You ok for tea then?” I hazarded.

“Oh we will ALWAYS have a cup of tea.” They said

“Never say no to a cuppa” they beamed.

The thing is, they aren’t using my downstairs loo  and they have no port a loo. I was thinking that maybe only one of the massive flasks they bring each day holds tea and the other is for when its…decanted back(?) But today they were drinking from both of them, so this left me wondering…just how large is a builder’s bladder?

favourite childhood toys

I have a photo of myself around three years old hugging a yellow and white bear, spool forward nearly 40 years and the same bear is on my bed at my father’s house. He is faded, his mouth is missing, there are ancient Ribena stains from a teddy bear’s tea party, he smells a bit too, but if no one is looking, I give him a hug and my dad would never, ever throw him away.

The day after we brought our first baby home, my aunt sent a small, yellow real love™ bear. We put it in the Moses basket, it squeaked. We named it Winston. We have never seen another bear exactly like it and once the baby was throwing things out of pushchairs, believe me we looked for it. It no longer squeaks, I was trying to speed dry it and may have ironed it , thus sealing the plastic squeak inside it.

 The middle child has a Miffy toy, on a rare expedition to Waitrose she grabbed an identical one. This was a plan! She only ever saw one Miffy at a time until she was 23 months old and I was hospitalised with pregnancy sickness. Daddy didn’t understand the rules, from that moment she owned The Miffy Twins. They are a pest, even now they squeal in some high-pitched, made-up language that has a nails-down-the-blackboard effect on me. My husband calls them Ronnie and Reggie.

 The third child is sneaky, she discovered two Betsys early on. This was a tiny, soft bunny bought from Mothercare. It had a pretty frock, which is now in tatters and soft ears which she would chew on. I created another monster in this toy, it talks in a Columbian accent and sings “Tequila” after a chant which goes, “Your mother loves you, your mother loves you, don’t bite my ear’ole, don’t bite my ear ‘ole, don’t bite my leg! Lalalalallalala etc”. Obviously, I try to substitute the shout of “Tequila” for something more bunny rabbitty and then the bunnies tickle the child, who laughs her head off and begs for more…. Look, don’t judge me. For any of you who have ever tried to settle a fretful child, I’m sure you have come up with or will come up with some ridiculous routines. It all makes sense when you are suffering from sleep deprivation/ mastitis/ cabin fever.

So these are the must have toys. They are packed carefully into cases when we are setting off on holidays. We all check they are repacked for the return journey. Last summer we travelled home from Salisbury to the Midlands with eldest weeping as she thought she had left Winston. (she had been away with choir and done her own packing) We chided and comforted her, nothing worked. When we got home we found him in her luggage but I know if we had not, my weary husband may have turned the car around. These are not just toys, they are family.

reading at bedtime routine

The bedtime routine used to be so simple and strictly adhered to. CBeebies bed time story in pjs, wash, teeth, snuggle into bed and negotiate the number of bed time stories to be read. Then my eldest children turned into bookworms and, more often than not, I was reading aloud and they were reading something else. I gave up, I gave them 30 minutes reading time before lights out. I thought it would be calming. It certainly calmed me, until I realised that they were insisting on the landing light being left on, not because of fear of the dark but because they were shuffling down to the foot of the bed and squinting at their reading books for another sneaky half an hour. I was cross, but how do you tell a child off for reading?

Our five year old usually picks daddy at bedtime, she can twist the poor man round her little finger and he will reread her stories, I only get to do it if he is out. Then I realised something – I missed it! I tried to reintroduce it, I failed.

I dallied with Little Women and stuck to one chapter an evening, except not every evening. We read about half of it.

I had better luck with Alice in Wonderland, although I did skip The Caucaus race and the Mock Turtle chapters. I started  Through the Looking Glass and someone hid the book. I can take a hint, Thank you.

How did I stray away from the bedtime routine? It’s important! My mother would only read a tiny bit to me and then sidle out of the room leaving me to read to myself, because I was “such a good reader” at an early age, I vividly recalled the loneliness and disappointment I felt. I would even try to choose a book I thought she liked. I’m not criticising my mum at all, she was seeking precious moments of solace in an unhappy marriage that wouldn’t last for many more years. However this has always been in my mind when it comes to reading to my children.

This week I have made another, concerted effort. I was inspired by the fact that the eldest child was selecting books for her younger sister to try, now that Diary of The Wimpy Kid series has finally fallen to pieces. They chose David Walliams’ Ratburger. I am reading two chapters a night in order to get to the end of it before I run out of steam. It’s not bad, it’s just not Roald Dahl, even though Quentin Blake has illustrated it. However by the second night, my eldest child (9 going on 19) put aside whatever Jaqueline Wilson/ Cath Cassidy/ Jean Ure book she was reading and crept down the bunk steps to snuggle up and listen too.

Tonight, their dad is working late. I’m taking youngest to bed and reading her stories until she tells me to “Go!” Then I will snuggle up on the bottom bunk and read Ratburger. Next week: Roald Dahl returns!

morning routine

Today I did not want to get out of bed. I didn’t  have work , it’s  a Mummy day. I had had a rare undisturbed night’s sleep that began with an early night. The alarm went off at 6.30 and husband got out of bed without a fuss or me having to beat him with pillows. He returned from the bathroom at 7 and I was still in bed. I was thinking about the title of the book by Sue Townsend “The woman who went to bed for a year”. I have never read the book but I was seriously contemplating the idea ; considering the practicalities. My husband set about me with the hair dryer until I rolled out of bed.

I put school clothes out for three children, helping the youngest with her shirt buttons and tights. I refused to referee the eldest two’s continual battle over bedroom territory. I did not raise my voice once.

I prepared the toothbrushes in order to avoid the bathroom being cemented with toothpaste.

I went downstairs and started breakfast.

“Do you want a boiled egg?” I asked the middle child

“I CAN’T HAVE AN EGG!“ she bellowed, “its…I…you… actually, yes please mummy.”

A moment later,

“I CAN’T FIND MY SHOOOOOOOEEEESSSS!” wailed my banshee child.

I calmly pointed out that they were on the stairs.

My husband looked at me closely, “ Are you ok?” he asked

“I’m not shouting” I replied

“That’s why I asked you if you were ok.”

He quietly slipped upstairs to check on the progress.

You see, every morning is mayhem. With me dragging sleepy girls out of bed and shrieking instructions, I try competitions and count downs and even bribery with pocket money.

An old teacher friend of ours used to say about new innovations, “ Everything works on a Monday”

Not in my house mate.

Nothing works on a Monday or any other day of the week, including Saturday and Sunday, when we always appear to be racing to get to an activity, event or party. I am always, always chivvying them along; cajoling, pleading, threatening and any other form of persuasion that comes to mind.

Not today. Today I did not want to get out of bed because of it. Today I allowed my two bookworms and tiny wordsmith to get on with it. I had given them what they needed and  they knew what they had to do.

We had breakfast together and they sat without an argument. I put classic FM on in the back ground. I don’t know if that was to keep me calm or to calm them. None of them hid behind a reading book  and no art work / creative writing competed with eating.  They cleared their plates and finished their drinks.

Husband made me a cup of tea. Husband kissed everyone and went to work. I got two kisses.

I brushed their hair; no screaming. Coats and bags by the door.

We were calm.

We were late.

beauty

One time, I was sitting cradling a cappuccino at a Wacky Warehouse party and fate had sat me next to a slim, glamour mum. Everything was going well , until she talked about spa weekends away she had with girlfriends, assuming I did the same.  Once I had picked my jaw up off the ground, I lost the will to live and wallowed in a sense of inadequacy which mellowed into resentment towards my other half, who was obviously denying me my civil liberties.

My beauty regime has certainly changed since having children,  I gave up wearing tailored jackets once the baby sick appeared. Some days I get to work and do not realise until someone points out, that I have tooth paste smeared all over some part of my clothing. (rarely my own toothpaste, you understand.)

Remember 90s big hair? I had The Rachel cut and used to spend time in the morning in Velcro curlers! If I manage to straighten my fringe these days it’s a miracle. I have also lost my tweezers,  I got a thick fringe cut so that no one could see the monsters that I now have for eyebrows.  I also appear to have a rogue whisker growing in my chin- arghh! Whilst on the subject of hair, I get mine cut about four  times a year, when they ask me if I want product I ask for everything! Last year someone bought me a hair set which included dry shampoo- it was a miracle in a can! It ran out a few months ago and I haven’t got round to buying anymore.  If I step foot in Boots the Chemists, it’s to buy Calpol.

Gone are the days when I would lock myself in the bathroom once a week and shave, pluck and scrub. I no longer have leave-in conditioner and my face mask is well passed its sell by.  We don’t have a full size bath, so at least my kids can’t jump in with me. One of my best friends is not allowed to have a bath without sharing. However, I am never in the bath that one of the girls doesn’t come in to use the toilet and either A) stare at my aging body, B) make a comment on my body or C) laugh at my body. I would like to inform them that they share my genes and I come from a long line of buxom country wenches, but I don’t want to give them nightmares. Instead I tell them that they are to blame for my belly.

Nothing on my body is trimmed, shaved or moisturised. My legs are scaly, I am turning into a reptile. My teeth are crooked and yellowing because I keep having to cancel dentist’s appointments, I’ve gained weight because I eat on the hop or finish off whatever they have left on their plates and my hair has some grey, but my girls say I’m beautiful and that’s good enough for me.

about Mummy Guilt

There isn’t a week that doesn’t go past that I do not suffer from mummy guilt at some point:  I have forgotten to do something, to buy something, to say something or to attend something.

I try my best, I am not very organised, so I buy a family calendar and the rule is that: if it’s happening; it goes on the calendar. Husband quite often gets a flea in his ear when he springs some work commitment which is not on the calendar or clashed with something on the calendar. This year, the first calendar I bought was a week to week one- no good. Then my mum gave me a month to month calendar- first problem there is only four columns and there are five of us. Nevermind, me and the man will share one we don’t do as much as the girls anyway. Then I find out it’s a wipe-able surface with a whiteboard pen. As it hangs by the back of the youngest’s dining chair this is not a good thing, so we have endeavoured to scratch in appointments and parents evenings in biro which generally refuse to write after the third or fourth letter.

The other place for reminders is the fridge; school letters, reminder, party invitations cling desperately to it tethered by aging fridge magnets, if the door is left open. They sometimes get blown off or knocked off. 

My mummy friends, who have known me longest, tend to try to remind me of things.

Now this week, the eldest two had science projects to be handed in as well as literacy and numeracy homework, so Sunday was a boot camp of assignment completing, presentation rehearsing and spelling tests rather than snuggling on the sofa watching Matilda or walking to the park. Then Monday, middle child was sick…so was I but I had taken a sick day the previous week and insisted I had to go to work. Husband took day to look after her. She missed school photos day and I had her hair right and her uniform clean and pressed. Yesterday went well. Today I was trying to calm eldest child, who I have to pick up in 20 minutes to take to violin grade (I must not be late!)

I was also discussing World Book day costumes with the two eldest, (Mary Poppins and The White rabbit) Bunny onesie may be too hot and stuffy. We were considering alternatives. I dropped the eldest two at junior school early as its COOL KIDZ day and then sat with youngest for a while, having an amazing time, learning new words. We laughed a lot. Her nose was dirty, her face a bit smudged and her hair is a dandelion clock of riotous curls escaping from lop sided bunches. I love her: she is perfect. I stepped out into a world of pristine little girls with slides and bows and clean, shiny faces. It is school photo day. I now have mummy guilt. 

 

loving with food

My mother used to love us with food – which was ironic because when my brother and I were small, she couldn’t cook. She’d make a picnic for any journey over an hour and cooked breakfasts every morning until I started secondary school.  A few years and a divorce later, she got a job as a housekeeper for a farmer who ate fruitcake for breakfast.  She spent a month practising; the birds in the garden were so fat they couldn’t fly when she left.

In my second year of university I decided to learn to cook. My then boyfriend’s mother had given me a cook book and I spent my grant on ingredients. My skinny boyfriend and waif- like flat mate gained weight that term and I spent quite a lot of time freezing in and outside phone boxes ringing my dad ( yes my dad!) for cooking advice.

Anyway I am now a good cook and, although I would never knowingly have started to love with food, I do. My Mum was very ill last year,I went to look after her for a week and cooked and cooked; filling her freezer. My friend’s dad had a stroke last summer,  I made her an apple pie, because I know it’s hard to eat when you’re to- ing and fro- ing. When my sister in law had a major set-back, I made her a beef stew, because I thought she wouldn’t feel like cooking.

When I had children, I followed my health visitor’s advice. I cut out salt and I made sure they had food from all the groups; including fruit and veg. I put home cooked meals in front of them even the evenings when I work and do they sit and eat without prejudice? Do they heck! They are fussy eaters! They are much fussier than I ever was. Maybe I have given them too much choice, but I do know they could happily live on sausages, toad in the hole, pasta, Bolognese, pizza. Eldest will not touch peas, middle child will not touch sweetcorn, some evenings I cook the corn and peas together and dish up, then watch them sort out the corn from the peas and swap with each other.  

I have to make their packed lunches because when my husband does it he gets it wrong and they complain and come back hungry. Eldest has plain bread, but will make sandwiches if you put cucumber and tomatoes in a bag, middle child will only eat bread and butter, youngest child will eat ham or cheese sandwiches, but eats in whatever order she wants.  None of them like wholemeal bread, much. They all like crackers. Eldest will not eat bananas or raisins and they all want different flavoured crisps.

There have been times when I say, “That’s it! You will eat what’s in front of you!” But they are more stubborn than I. They go hungry. I suffer from mummy guilt. You see, I do love with food.

running about

I started scribbling this whilst feigning interest in my children’s swimming lessons – not that I don’t want them to learn I just wish it would happen faster! I seem to have spent five years sweating in the sauna of changing rooms, wrestling with one, two or all three wringing, wet children. Don’t get me started on the etiquette – or lack of it – in the changing room. I have seen civilized women nearly come to blows over the showers. It’s not a pleasant experience and my own behaviour is unlikely to win me Mother of the Year award. Today someone in the next class vomited, which meant that two hoards of swimmers and fed up mothers jostled for position. After this I drop eldest off at dancing, the youngest has been to a party. (Daddy opted to take her)

Monday evenings are our free evening, we return shell-shocked from work, put children in bed by 8, so husband and I can sit and silently watch University Challenge. At the start of the year, I thought we had managed to wangle two free evenings. Two! Then middle child’s piano lessons started on a Tuesday, before tea! What a fun school pick up that is! Military precision is required, but never attained. 3.15 the heavens open,as they are frog marched the short journey from Junior to infant school, generally scolding middle one for forgetting reading book, school cardigan, diary, lunch box etc. The youngest one throws me her bag, coat and today’s art piece. We charge back, stopping every few yards for a head count and identity check. They argue about seating arrangements in the car, I am soaked. We squabble home, unless subdued by smarties.  Everything is dumped at the door, demands for drinks and snacks. Scooby Doo pacifies them for twenty minutes. I usher two of them into the kitchen to attempt a bit of homework, often resulting in another argument, in hushed tones now as the piano lesson is in full flow and we do not wish to scandalise the teacher.

Weds is a slightly later piano lesson, tea has to be ready when they come in!

Thursdays is a work day for me, I dash madly back to put tea on and prepare for Thursday evening mayhem; eldest is taken to orchestra practise by friend (5.15), middle child goes to karate (6p.m) , I go to collect eldest and friend (6.30) drop friend off (6.50) Collect karate kid(7.00), Eldest child decides she must practise violin, youngest child says its bed time, husband quite often goes out about now- don’t blame him.

Friday; I rush back from work for eldest child who sings in a choir every Sunday, it is practise night. We pop into Costa, she gets embarrassed by my loud laugh and edges to the door as soon as she sees the senior choir girls arrive. They drink hot chocolate, she drinks hot chocolate so she is cool by association. I drink tea. I am not so cool.

about making friends

I was thinking of writing about school gate politics, so I looked at a couple of articles online and felt depressed.

I considered the rules of friend making.

As a teenager, I was annoyed when my mother befriended my friend’s mothers. She was newly divorced and, having moved away from her home town, had no other way of making new friends, but my thirteen year old self didn’t know that. She adopted my mother in law as a sister and they are irritatingly close. However, I socialise with the mothers I have met at the school gate and at least one of them I would consider a best friend for life, so I can longer grumble can I? That is because that is where I have made friends over the past ten years; antenatal classes (one friend), parent toddler groups, (three friends), nursery (three friends), Sunday school (three friends) and the school gate (number to be confirmed)

I agree with the forums I read in one respect, there are certainly tribes at the school gate and I belong to the part-time mum tribe, but after three kids and 5 years of school so far, the full time mums have gotten used to me but not my changing work day. There are differences too, when my eldest started at the school nursery, she made a best friend in the first term and has kept her right through primary into year 5. (We are not thinking about what happens after year 6 when different secondary schools beckon.) My middle child was born in August and I wept when she started nursery two weeks after her 3^rd birthday and then a year later when she started school two weeks after her fourth and was immediately invited to a 5^th birthday party. Playing a continual game of catch up for the first three years, once divided from her cousin in reception, she has never really bonded with any one child.  We are always away for her birthday or her classmates are away, so birthday parties were abandoned which, in return, saw the end of party invites. The youngest, half way through reception, knows everybody and runs up to little boys and girls forcing them to hold her hand whether they want to know or not, we are inundated with party invites, I appear to be spending at least two hours most weekends, ferrying her to one play centre or another. Here I sit amongst strangers, the only thing I appear to have in common with is the age of our children. Over pale tea and party food we begin stilted conversation and strange rituals of swapping mobile numbers, discussing chid care and weight loss.

 Really, I have enough friends, I just want to read a book, but I will go and chat to the other mums so that they will invite my child to another party and … you never know, my new best friend could be sitting there.

Finance fun and failure in February

So the first week of February has passed and my vow to get back into the Black looks decidedly unlikely now. So I have taken steps. Six of them, to be precise, from the car to the cash point.  I have taken all the money out that I can possibly afford to spend this month. I have compiled a list of the meals we will eat – it took a while as I am not known for my forward thinking. After sucking on my pencil until Tuesday’s toad in the hole, I accosted my husband with, “What do you want for tea- on Wednesday?”

He rolled his eyes and retreated behind his guitar, but his parting offer was to buy £3.99 wine from the local Aldi – a fine saving provided we don’t drink a bottle a night.

I try to learn lessons from the women that raised us. My husband recounts how growing up they had certain meals on certain nights – the same every week. It’s not one of his most riveting anecdotes. Like my own Mother, I intend to shop about a bit too and not pick up the nearest item, but I do make the classic mistake of taking a child shopping with me on a Saturday afternoon. My mother used to spend what felt like hours comparing identical frozen chickens, driving me to tears of boredom at a young age. On one occasion I trapped my thumb in part of the freezer and spent ten exciting minutes watching various members of staff flap about until the store manager arrived with soap and stern words.

So now I sit to write my definitive shopping list, with the intention of sticking to it. I have crossed off cakes and biscuits, because I have all the necessary ingredients in the cupboards and intend to spend the evening Mary Berrying it around the kitchen. I refuse to be distracted by the telly and cheap wine.

Anyway, back to my cash crisis. I count out everything I usually use cash to pay for ;- child minder, piano lessons, dance lessons, karate class, market shopping, church collection and put aside a little to cover whatever book/ craft/ toy Fayre or disco the two primary schools my daughters go to want to surprise me with. Aghast, I eye my dwindled wad of cash and start to panic. I also remember it’s MY birthday this month – darn it! Decide to pay for supermarket shop with plastic but will not ask for cash back. Don’t think there will be any funds left anyway. February suddenly doesn’t seem such a short month after all.

Inevitably, of course, all of my planning is completely scuppered by the discovery that middle child’s school shoes are “leaking a bit”, further investigation shows a massive hole in the sole. Quick trip to shoe shop, try my luck at a bargain and get £3 off the price. Have you seen the price of properly fitted children’s shoes?

 “Cobblers” I say.